boot delay between "ASL Sender Statistics" and "Boot windows acquired"

[joncas]

I'm trying to figure out why there is a 20+ seconds boot delay between "ASL Sender Statistics" and "Boot windows acquired" with Monterey and Big Sur, which was not the case up to Catalina.
Visually, this is when there is a pause in the progress bar under the Apple logo, at the point when the display normally redraws after loading the GPU kext. (I'm guessing, because on other builds there is a change in screen resolution at that point).
This is a Haswell Hackintosh with Gigabyte Z97-SOC mainboard, i5-4590 processor and iGPU HD4600, booting with OpenCore 0.80.
Once it's booted, everything works normally, so it is just an annoyance when initially turning it on.
I've tried three different SMBios definitions: MacMini7,1 and iMac16,2 and iMac17,1 but it makes no difference.
On two other builds, one with a Skylake mainboard and the other with Coffee Lake, this pause doesn't happen, but they also have dedicated GPUs, so maybe that is the reason?
Attached is the OpenCore config.plist and the boot log where the delay is visible at Apr 24 09:00:11

Many thanks for any insights!

 

[Edhawk]

Your config.plist can't be opened with ProperTree, it gives an error about incorrect padding.

error message when opening your config.plist.

Can you open the config in whichever Plist Editor you normally use and see about fixing this error so we can read your config.

 

[joncas]

Many thanks for trying to help!
It's odd, because I also use ProperTree, probably something went wrong when I tried to edit out the serial numbers. Just redit “OC Clean Snapshot" on the three smbios versions I tried and left the SMBIOS data intact and will just use different serials, so they should now open.
The one with iMac16,2 actually doesn't boot. On Dortania that is the recommended model for use with Haswell / Monterey and iGPU, but other people seem to have trouble with using that, too.

In the meantime I also experimented with adding a graphic card and found an old Nvidia GT710. This does remove the boot delay, but the GT710 isn't compatible any more so there is no kext and the resolution is low.
It does prove that the boot delay seems to have to do with the absence of a GPU,

 

[Edhawk]

If you want or need to boot the system using just the HD4600 IGPU, then the MacMini7,1 SMBIOS is the correct one to use.

Have you seen my Monterey Guide for running the latest OS on a Haswell system?

[GUIDE] Haswell System - MacOS Monterey 12.0.1 OC 0.7.5

Haswell System running macOS Monterey 12.0.1 CPU: i5-4440 + HD4600 IGPU MB: GA-Z87MX-D3H Mem: 16GB (2 x 8GB) SSD: 1 x Samsung 840 EVO 120GB HDD: 3 x WD Green 2TB (JOBD) WIFI/BT: Broadcom BMC4360CD (Apple WIFI card on PCIe x1 adapter) PSU: EVGA 500Wr Case: Fractal Design R5 (Titanium Grey Solid)...

www.tonymacx86.com

 

[joncas]

Many thanks !
The attempt to try iMac16,2 came from looking for a way to get rid of the extra boot delay, so while researching that, I had come across that recommendation on https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Install-Guide/extras/monterey.html#supported-smbios :

• Haswell desktops with only an iGPU should use iMac16,2

I'll stick with MacMini7,1 now!

 

[Edhawk]

Of the three config's you provided only the iMac16,2 plist contains any IGPU framebuffer information. That config sets the IGPU to drive a display, but lacks a few other framebuffer entries that would help your system.

The MacMini7,1 config should contain the same framebuffer entries, shown below.



DeviceProperties for Haswell HD4600 IGPU, when IGPU used to drive a display.

You should only use the iMac17,1 when the IGPU is accompanied by a discrete GPU. As the IGPU should be set to run in Headless mode with an empty framebuffer, as shown below.



As you have a HD4600 IGPU you do not need to use a fake ID for the IGPU, so device-id=<04001204> is not required.

 

[joncas]

Many thanks for taking the time to explain all that!
I added the missing definitions, but it still takes ca 32 seconds from the OpenCore picker to the desktop, versus 16 seconds when there is a dGPU, so I guess it must be something inherent to how Monterey handles iGPU displays, and it is not a big deal, and I don't want to waste any more of your time on it.

 

[Edhawk]

Are you changing the Bios settings in relation to the IGPU and DGPU when you remove the Nvidia card?

As you should set the IGPU as primary display output in the bios, when the Nvidia card has been removed.

It is possible leaving the Bios with the DGPU set as the default graphics output could cause a delay while booting. Not sure it would cause a 32 second delay.

 

[joncas]

Yes, the bios is set correctly (in fact, on this mainboard there is no display output at all when the setting is wrong).

I'll just consider the question to be one of those unsolved mysteries and try to get a used RX580 gpu!

 

[remorema]

might be software related. I have a map mid 2014 running Monterey on a pcie 4x name ssd with is blazing fast booting windows 11 in 10 secs, and takes over 30 to boot monterey.now that I've came across this post ill boot it in verbose and try to see where it hangs the most when booting.